She tried to speak and called out hoarsely, “Mason.”
Upon hearing his name, the man tightened his arms around her, burying his face into her shoulder as he murmured, “I’m here. I’m here right now.”
Janet shuddered slightly and bit on her lip as her eyes rimmed red. How could this be? How could things turn out this way? I almost killed him with my two hands!
“Don’t cry, Babe,” he said, his voice low and raspy.
He moved away from her shoulder and his fingers grazed along his face. With a tearing sound, the hyper-realistic face mask came off and fell on the ground.
Janet lifted her gaze. When she saw the familiar handsome and devilish face before her, the tears that threatened to overwhelm finally fell.
In all the time he had known and been together with her, he never saw her cry and certainly not with such anguish.
It was heart-wrenching to see her break down like this. There were many things he wanted to tell her, but he did not know where to start.
He could only draw her closer, rubbing the small of her back as he kissed the tears that streamed down her cheeks.
“Don’t cry, Janet. I don’t like seeing you cry,” Mason said softly in his bass-like voice. “When you cry, it’s as if someone is driving a knife through my heart. It hurts to see you like this.”
In fact, seeing her cry like this only made him feel less of a man. He thought about all the danger he had put her through and asked himself whether he was worthy of her love.
Meanwhile, Janet was distraught as she wrapped her arms around his neck, muttering in between sobs, “It shouldn’t be you. How could you be here?”
He had been Peter all along. The man whom she was trying to kill was none other than Mason himself.
She thought about what had happened the day before—if she had not saved Peter, she would have lost Mason altogether.
She was relieved and devastated at the same time—relieved to have saved him, but devastated that he was now in danger, just like she was.
There were no words that could describe how she felt right now.
When Mason saw her tears glisten in the dimness, he felt his heart ache once more. He took Janet’s face in his hands and said firmly, “Stop crying.”
With that, he lowered his head. His lips found hers and he was desperate to kiss away her sorrow.
Janet’s brows drew together slightly and all she felt at that moment was a shuddering relief that was pierced by anguish.
Suddenly, she was abruptly lifted off the ground.
Mason’s face was buried in her neck and his breath was shallow. He was shuddering with the effort of containing his tears, much like she was.
She was startled for a moment and once again, tears were pricking her eyes.
Her lips twitched as though she wanted to say something, but the words crumbled on her tongue.
Janet could feel the warmth as his lips pressed against the skin on her neck and the familiarity of his touch. Slowly, the tears stopped. Her eyes were watery as she kept herself from crying, but it only made for a heartbreaking sight.
“I love you, Mason,” she whispered weakly, her voice straining to escape from her parted lips.
Upon hearing that, Mason stiffened before he held her tight against him. He cupped the back of her head with one hand and leaned in to kiss her.
Unlike their previous kiss, there was nothing tender about this one. She could feel the hard slant of his lips against hers and there was an urgency between them that was almost primal, as though they were desperate to make sure that the both of them existed in the same space.
The kiss lasted for nearly ten minutes and when they could taste copper in their mouth, they slowly released each other.
She wrapped her arms around his waist and rested her head against his chest; she was quiet as she listened to his heartbeat.
After a while, Mason asked hesitantly, “Janet, who sent you to kill me?”
Janet paused for a while. When she decided that it was pointless to hide the truth from him, she answered, “Corey.”
“Corey?” He froze. “President Corey?”
Janet reached up and traced her fingers along his jaw, nodding as she answered, “That’s right. The same president who gave you a present at your twenty-sixth birthday party. He told me that the Hawke Kingdom would threaten his power and he was worried about the implications. Moreover, he assigned half of Markovia’s military rights to you, so I agreed to go on the mission as a way to return his favor.”
So, that’s what’s going on, Mason thought.
For a moment, he was as still as a statue. The pieces were falling into place. It was no wonder that they could find him even when he had been incognito—after all, it was the President of Markovia who was tracking his every move and who else had access to immediate and accurate intel but him?
Even if Mason had tried his best to stay off the grid, there was no way he could have avoided being spied on by the President.
